Amity
by WillowDryad
Summary: Peter and Edmund have a much-needed conversation. A companion piece to "Counted Among the Traitors." Contains spoilers! Golden Age. No slash.


**Author's Note: This story contains spoilers for my other story "Counted Among the Traitors." If you haven't read that one, this one probably won't make much sense. If you have read that one, then read on.**

**Towards the end of Chapter Nineteen of "Counted Among the Traitors," once the false Knight, Gilfrey Becke, had been taken away to the dungeon, Peter and Edmund and Lucy spent the night in the High King's wide bed, "nestled together like kittens in a basket." Sometime during that night, Peter and Edmund had a conversation about what had happened since Edmund's banishment. Here's what they talked about.**

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**Disclaimer: Edmund and Peter Pevensie and all the characters and situations in the Chronicles of Narnia belong to C. S. Lewis and not to me. **

AMITY

Peter looked fondly at his baby sister as she lay asleep curled up next to him, still with his bandaged hand cradled against her heart and her head against his shoulder. Sometimes she didn't seem any older than she had been when they had first come into Narnia. She hadn't lost any of that childlike wonder and trusting faith.

She had believed in Edmund. When no one else had, not Oreius, not Susan, not – Aslan forgive him– not Peter himself, Lucy had believed. No matter how heinous the evidence, she had believed him true and honorable and innocent.

Dear Lu. Truly she was a Badger in her unshakeable faith in those she loved. Peter wasn't certain yet all she had done to save him and Edmund and all of Narnia, but he knew she had been brave and clever. How could he ever thank her?

He stroked her golden hair with his good hand, and she sighed in response, clutching his hand more tightly in her sleep. He hissed softly at the throbbing pain in his newly stitched palm and fingers, but he didn't move his hand away from her. He deserved that pain, deserved whatever scars came of those wounds, deserved very much worse.

"Peter?"

He turned his head at the whisper. There, in the dim, flickering light of the hearth fire, he saw his brother was awake on the other side of him, propped up on one elbow, dark eyes filled with concern.

"It's awfully late," Peter said, keeping his voice low. "I thought you were asleep."

"I thought _you_ were. Are you all right?"

Careful not to disturb Lucy, Peter shifted a little to turn more towards Edmund. "I haven't done much more than sleep for a long, long time. Can't really sleep now. Now that I can think a bit more clearly again, I have a lot to think about. I didn't want to bother either of you."

Edmund smiled at their sister, too. "Poor kid. She must be worn out. It's hard work keeping you alive you know."

He smirked, and Peter tried to smile back at him. Then he threw his head back against his pillow, squeezing his eyes shut.

"Aslan help me, Edmund, everything I did–"

Edmund shook his head. "I told you, it wasn't your–"

"You told me that, when I was feeling better, we'd talk about what a fool I've been."

Edmund pressed his lips together. "Have been or are now?"

"I'm feeling better," Peter persisted, looking at him again. "Tell me everything I did."

"You don't remember?"

"Only some of it." Peter licked his lips, his mouth suddenly dry. "After you– After you left, I don't remember all that much. Even the time before that seems . . . unreal." He glanced at their sister, still sweetly asleep against him. "I remember I had to tell her you were gone. I had to tell her what I'd done, that I had banished you. After that– After that, things are a bit hazy for me. Except for the nightmares."

"It was the poison, Peter. It causes the most horrific nightmares."

"Yes." Peter wiped the slick sweat from his upper lip. "It does."

He didn't say anything else for a moment, and then he felt Edmund's hand on his shoulder.

"Do you want to tell me about them?"

"I– I don't know, Ed. They were so terrible. Bloody and suffocating and hopeless. You were–" Peter's voice caught in his throat, and he felt a painful tightness in his chest. "Will you– Will you do something for me, Edmund?"

"Of course."

Peter smiled faintly, amazed even now at his brother's unhesitating willingness to do any and everything for him. "Even if it seems odd?"

Edmund smirked again. "In Narnia? What do we have besides odd?"

Peter glanced at Edmund's chest and then looked back into his face. "Will you unlace your shirt?"

"My shirt?"

Edmund looked puzzled, concerned and wary all at once, but Peter nodded.

"Please."

Edmund had taken off his boots and his doublet before he lay down, but he still wore his shirt and breeches and, bless Susan for them, a warm pair of socks. He looked at Peter now as if he were still incoherent, but he did as he was asked, sitting up and undoing the laces so his shirt hung open. Peter slipped his bandaged hand out of Lucy's grasp and sat up, too, tentatively touching Edmund's chest, shaken with relief to see it was unmarked. There was nothing there but a few half-healed scrapes. Jadis hadn't–

"What– what happened?"

Edmund only shrugged. "Just a little disagreement with a Hag. It's nothing."

"A Hag? The one who testified against you?"

"She seemed to think she deserved to have the fruit from the Canicule Tree more than I did."

Peter nodded. What all had Edmund gone through to save his life?

"I see you won."

Edmund shook his head. "No. But I'm happy to say Aslan did."

"Aslan. He was with you?"

"Always. He was–"

"That was one of the worst parts of the nightmares," Peter confessed, once more feeling the cold sweat on his face. "He was– He was there. In my nightmares, He was there, but He couldn't help me. He couldn't do anything. It was terrible. And you– Every word I said– She cut– " He touched Edmund's chest again, grimacing at the memory of his own words of banishment etched in blood, deep and raw, in that flesh. "Oh, Edmund, it was Jadis."

Peter could feel Edmund's body tense.

"Jadis?"

"She was in my nightmares, too. Torturing you. Killing the girls. And I– I became just like her. I demanded blood payment for your treason. I refused Aslan's offer to die in your place. I wanted to kill you. I wanted to. I– I–" Peter's voice shook, and he traced his fingers over the shallow cut the false Knight's blade had left in Edmund's neck. "I cut your throat."

"Peter–"

"On the Stone Table, I cut your throat with your broken blade." Peter glanced at his bandaged hand once more, blinking away the tears that burned in his eyes. "I didn't care that I hurt myself so long as I could hurt you more. And you didn't– "

Peter drew a sobbing breath, tears spilling over now, and Edmund clasped his forearm, steadying him.

"You didn't fight me, Edmund. You knew you were innocent, but you didn't fight me. You said– You said you'd follow me even if it meant your death."

Edmund's dark lashes fell to his suddenly flushed cheeks. "I would."

"No. Edmund, you mustn't. I nearly lost everything, you, the girls, Narnia, because I was too stupid to know when I was being deceived. If it hadn't been for you–"

"Drugged," Edmund insisted. "Not stupid."

"I might have had you executed!"

"But you didn't." Edmund squeezed his arm more tightly, a touch of a smile now on his lips. "Don't you see? No matter what that Snake did, no matter how much of that poison he gave you, he couldn't make you order my death. Even when you believed I had betrayed you and Narnia and Aslan Himself, you wouldn't do it." Sudden tears pooled in the dark eyes. "You couldn't do it."

Peter closed his eyes, lowering his head. "But there were other things I did do. Terrible things I said to you. Things that were cruel. Things that hurt. How can you–"

"They did hurt. I won't lie, Peter. But then I found out what that Snake was doing to you, and I knew none of it was your fault. I was just afraid he'd kill you before I could stop him."

Peter shook his head in amazement, remembering what Lucy had told him. _He never stopped loving you, not for a minute._

"Eddie, I–"

"I know." Edmund wiped his eyes. "And I'll know you're lying if you tell me you're not tired now. You can hardly sit up anymore."

Peter smiled faintly. He was feeling rather sleepy again. Or maybe he just felt better.

"Maybe I ought to–"

"Of course you ought to. Lie down, and let the rest of us get some sleep, too." Edmund scowled fiercely. "And don't call me Eddie."

With a bit of a laugh, Peter did as he was told. Lucy, still soundly asleep, only shifted close to him again, one arm flung across him and her head nestled against his shoulder.

"Goodnight, love," he whispered, kissing her hair.

Then he glanced at his younger brother who was lying on the other side of him, eyes closed, already starting to breathe deeply. With a mischievous grin, he pulled Edmund close, too, and pressed a smacking kiss to the side of his head.

"Hey! Get off me, you great lummox!"

Peter chuckled softly, seeing that, after a halfhearted bit of squirming, Edmund settled where he was and fell asleep close to his side.

"Goodnight, brother mine," Peter murmured, closing his own eyes. "And thank you."


End file.
